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Start Your Monday With Heavy Rain And a Sanctions Order!

Judge Brown Sanctions Order

Oh boy, here we go:

This matter is before this Court as a result of the issuance of an Order Granting Motion to Compel Discovery (D.E. 37) wherein (paragraph 2) plaintiffs were allowed to show good cause, in writing, why sanctions should not be imposed for the necessity of the filing of the motion to compel. Plaintiffs responded (D.E. 42). The Court finds the response without merit and notes that it completely fails to address the issue at hand, andlor evinces a lack of knowledge ofthe Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.

The first four (4) plus pages of the response extol the merits of plaintiffs' case ... wonderful except that this has nothing, whatsoever, to do with the issue of the necessity of the filing of themotion to compel. Then plaintiffs explain that their failure to respond in a timely matter (sic) "was not intentional" and that defendant "suffered no prejudice".

It is never explained just exactly how the failure to respond was not intentional. Nowhere in this response is it suggested that a clerical error was made, that a date was overlooked, that a paper was misplaced, or anything else "unintentional". What is explained is that: (1) the plaintiffs "are two elderly individuals, and a widow"; (2) that they "all live in a remote region of Venezuela"; (3) they "do not have e-mails or faxes"; (4) "the various documents need to be translated into Spanish" and (5) "[Clonditions in Venezuela are not ideal for the rapid transmission of information". The Court has looked far and wide for the special laws of discovery that apply in these instances and has discovered none... and none has been cited by plaintiffs. Conspicuously missing from this motion - and from the Court file - is anything related to why plaintiffs did not attempt to seek some relief from the Court BEFORE the filing of the motion to compel due to these alleged exceptional and extraordinary circumstances.

There really should be a handbook for all the "special laws of discovery" that seem to crop up in pleadings nowadays.

Feel free to use this space to list some of your favorites!

Full post as published by South Florida Lawyers on April 26, 2010 (boomark / email).